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Campus "Unrest" demonstrations and consequences, 1970-1971

1970-05-24 Akron Beacon Journal Article: Kent State: The Search For Understanding Page 6

A22 Akron Beacon Journal , Sunday May  24, 1970 
SPECIAL KENT STATE SECTION 

Horn Roared : "This Assembly Is Unlawful"

Continued From Page A-17

an announcement five times. He said he looked at his watch. It was 11:58 a.m.
It wasn't exactly the stilted language of the "Revised Code Section 2923:51: Where five or more persons are engaged in violent or tumultuous conduct.. shall forthwith ..desist."
"This assembly is unlawful! The crowd must disperse at this time. This is an order!" the disembodied voice of the bullhorn demanded. 

"We shouted him down," said Steve Tarr, a freshman from Akron. He remembered the response. 
"Off the pigs ! Off the pigs! F--- the pigs ! F--- the pigs!"
" One, two, three, four." in a unisoned shout, "we don';t want your F----- war!" the din rose. 
"Ho, Ho. HO, Chi Minh! The NLF is gonna win!"
"Two, four six eight,. We don't want your fascist state"
"Disperse!" the bullhorn ordered, and a rock arched from the crowd, bounced on the grass, and hit the side of the jeep.
Uncounted others - scores or hundreds - would soon fly, "It just seemed like we were in a cloud part of the time," Gen. Robert H. Canterbury would recall. 

"A half of a brick almost knocked me down," said Maj. Jones. 
The troops had been assembled hurriedly. "I didn't even have a chance to go to the bathroom," said Sgt, Russell Repp, 23,, a Wooster tile and floor installer. "I hadn't slept in two nights He had no lunch. 
Tim Shaffer, a cook for A Company, said "We had chow mein and fruit salad for 250 men, About 10 guys ate."
Guardsman Jim Haiflich, a jeep driver from Ravenna, took care of it himself. He stopped at a Burger Castle. Art Krummel, like uncounted other guardsmen, remained off campus that noon. He guarded the town's sewage plant. 

In conference on the commons, Maj. Hones Lt. Col. Charles Fasssinger and Gen. Canterbury, the ranking brass, decided to form a skirmish line and forcefully break up the unlawful assembly. 
A few minutes after 12 noon, the guard formed a single long line in front of the ruins of the ROTC building. They put on gas masks. 
On order, they moved out in a skirmish line, bayonets fixed and unsheathed. Their mission: Disperse the students. 
Although there were perhaps 800 guardsmen at Kent that day, the dozens of photographs, of the skirmish line would show no more than 66. 

Capt. Ron Snyder took another contingent around the opposite northeast side of Taylor Hall. He said he had 42 men. 
Their weapons were loaded, live ammunition in the chambers, the M1's at "lock and load" A soldier would have to flick forward  safely before pulling a trigger. 
"This is our standard operating procedure," said Sgt. Mike Delany an Akron public relations man. It was the 145th's fifth call up for domestic disturbance since 1966. 

"Most of the guys had one or two clips" said Sgt. Dale Antram, referring to the initial call out for Teamster trouble five days before. Some ammunition was issued at KSU. 
"Nobody thought they had bullets," said Mike Glaser, 27. a graduate studying T.S .Eliot. "I had pictures of them

SHE WIPES UP BLOOD WITH FLAG 

loading bullets into the guns and I didn't realize it. Everyone just assumed they didn't "
"If we'd been black, we'd been smarter," said Glaser. "The agitators has these kids believing we had blanks. Somebody to.d them that," said Guard Capt. John E. Martin c. 

The Guard moved across the Commons, firing canisters of tear gas from M-79 grenade launchers, known as "elephant guns" the gas streaked skyward toward the students moving not unlike a herd of animals upward over "Blanket Hill " behind Taylor Hall. 
The campus radio log put the time at 12:05 p.m. 
Not everyone fled. Some students made forays from the massed body, retrieved the canisters and hurled them back toward the advancing guard. 
At that moment William D. Taylor, the retired journalism professor for whom the modernistic 20 pillared building was named in 1967, was attending as a consultant a meeting on outdoor drama at New Philadelphia. The drama outside his building intensified. 

"Some of those kooks had to be on dope," said Maj. Jones "I bet they've got needle marks on their arms, They were dancing and jiggling and throwing back the gas."
Much of the gas drifted back toward the Guard on the southwesterly wind. 
I picked up a canister and threw it back, but I stuck my face in the darn thing and had to be carried away," said Ben Parsons, 22, a drama senior wearing a headband. "it almost got to be a joke because the National Guardsmen were laughing. It as just a game. 
"The girls were hanging out the windows of the dorms, throwing us jars of cold cream, Noxzema and Vaseline for the gas. They really work great," Parsons said.

The Guard swept to the crest of "Blanket Hill" beside Taylor Hall. Students kept their distance. 
"I ran into the men's room at Taylor," said Jackie Stewart, the secretary for Dean Myron J. Lunine. "Everyone was. It was closest."
At least one youth came well equipped. He wore his own gas mask. Others wore gloves. 
"You could get 'e, (gas canisters) with your bare hands on the bottom before they got warm," said Steve Tarr, a young man accustomed to throwing footballs. 

The Guard appeared more uncomfortable than pressured. "I remember breathing very hard with all that junk on as we walked up the hill," said Pvt. Paul Navjoks. "The rock throwing was just occasional. The guy beside me got hit in the shoulder. I never got hit. It seemed like we were trying to drive the bad guys out of there."

Major Jones Tries To Stop Shooting 

" I still remember this one guy - the Apache headband with a flag. I thought to myself, these guys are crazy. You never knew who was a spectator and who was a rioter,"
With the veranda of Taylor Hall nearly deserted, the Guard swept over "Blanket Hill" without praise and down to the football practice field. They lined up close to a chain link fence, topped iwth barbed wire extending outward. 
This put the Guard much closer to the gravel of the parking lot southeast of Prentice Hall. 
"It was the heaviest rock throwing. I got hit 10 time." said Guard Sgt. Russelll Repp. "They were just having a good time. They thought we were a bunch of nobodies. 
"One good sized kid kept coming up behind me and stoning me from behind, then lying down about 25 yards away. I picked up a rock and ran and threw it back. I got him."

The crowd, now gathering on the front slope of Taylor Hall, alternately cheered and booed as a boy in white sneakers and Guardsmen hurled the same canister back and forth twice. 
The Guard gave up on the tear gassing. 
"It wasn't doing any good," said Repp "We didn't run out. I still had eight canisters on a bandolier."
Sixteen Guardsmen dropped to one knew on the practice field and seven aimed their M1's in firing position. "No one fired," said John Kifner, a New York Times reporter in the parking lot. 
Richard Schreiber, a journalism professor, peered through binoculars on the veranda and "saw a man in unfiorm with the troops draw a .45 pistol;" He aimed over the rock throwers and fired at least one round over their heads."Schreiber claimed he saw a tiny puff of smoke."
"It was still a yuk yuk yukkety crowd,"said Chris Butler,  drama student with Mickey Mouse on his T-shirt. "The Guard was rattled and they were out of gas and they had to move out and everybody cheered,"
As the time approached 12:20 p.m., the Guard moved off the practice filed and circled back up the slope in front of Taylor Hall. 
"We were walking up the hill but we were thinking behind us," said Sgt. Antram, who couldn't wear his glasses because of his mask "We were always glancing over our shoulders and guys were saying "Back there !" "Watch it" "Here comes a rock !"

Pvt. Paul Zimmerman said "It as hard to see through that plastic. To look behind you, you'd have to turn your head all the way around. I was hot and sweaty" 
"They all got into formation and they started back up the hill. They walked at a pretty fast pace. Then they started running," said Ben Parsons, the headbanded drama student. "Everybody started screaming because it was like we'd won."
"Almost all of us were in movement toward the National Guard. We were going at a slow walk. But I estimate 25 or 30 kids were running up the hill chasing them. Nobody was throwing any rocks. Five or six boys were close enough to touch them."
Precisely what transpired in the next moment perhaps will forever be in dispute. 
The mind of man is flawed and imperfect. Man often believes what he wants to believe. 
The Guardsmen reached the crest of "Blanket Hill" Guardsmen opened fire. 
Forever the contention will be asserted that the shooting was unnecessary.
The Guard could have called for reinforcements. The Guard could have fired warning shots into the air. The Guard could have aimed low, firing only to wound. The Guard could have warned its tormentors by bullhorn that its weapons were loaded. 
The Guard could have marched on over the hill - for it was not surrounded - and fired not at all. 

"All of a sudden they just turned and went to their knees and I thought they're going to scare us or something - they started shooting," said Danny Merman, 19, a student. 
"Everyone was up tight. No one was thinking of firing. Then I heard small arms fire, three shots, it might have been an echo, and the guys returned the fire," said Russell Repp, a Guardsman. 
"I was waiting for an order to shoot," said Paul Navjoks, a stocky 25 year old truck loader. "I knew if I heard a command I would have shot.
"I thought to myself, man, how are we going to get out of here? There is no way. They were getting closer and closer with those rocks and we were surrounded. 
"If we got to hand to hand combat, they would have overtaken us, and taken our bayonets, and started sticking us with our bayonets. If they come, I thought, they'll come like a mob. There was only two ways out of there. To run down the hill or shoot and hold them back . 
"We got to the crest of the hill and I was walking away and I heard all this noise. And I thought who'd be shooting firecrackers at a time like this?
"I turned and when I saw all those guys falling in front. I knew we were safe. They couldn't keep coming..... It was relief. I felt it was out only way out. 
"Everything happened so fast it was like a car wreck."

"Somebody was yelling, 'Watch where you shoot!' and afterwards, Major Jones was shaking his head like he was knocking his head on something. "
"I seen at least a couple spin, lock the butts of their rifles against their hips and fire straight up into the air and I seen some spin and fire without even looking," said Ben Parsons, student. 
"They got almost to the top of the hill, and just like on command, like one movement, they turned and started shooting... people got up right away and started yelling 'Murder!' said John Dienert, a student 
"I think I was closer than anyone. I was less than 10 feet away on the concrete at Taylor hall. They turned together. I did not hear an order to fire. I'm positive I would have. I heard no single shot. There was no snipe. They just started shooting," said Jackie Stewart, the dean's secretary " I was sure they were blanks, I just stood there."

"I was harassing this officer. I threw a stone at him, and he pointed a .45 caliber pistol at me. He was brandishing a swagger stick. He turned away. He was holding his baton in the air, and the moment he dropped it they fired." said Jim Minard, a student . 
"I didn't feel threatened," said Capt. Ray Srp, "and I was in the center of it."
"Eight or 10 of my men were disorientated. I was down [there?] physically dragging them back up when I heard two or three pops from down near the gym. I thought somebody had a .32 pistol. But now, I don't know whether it was a .22 or kids popping paper caps or what," said Capt. John E. Martin. 

Much later, after the Inspector General took statements, Capt. Martin would tell his men not to worry, they had not been warned of their Constitutional rights. 
"Not all the Guardsmen turned around and started shoot

"I didn't feel threatened, and..."

ing at us. Not all of them panicked. That's what it was - [Panic?]" said Dick Woods, a student. 
When the firing ceased - for a second, two seconds, several - a terrible stillness hung in the air. 
Even the G-sharp of the bell reverberating only seconds before, fell silent. 
Donald L. Schwartzmiller, the chief of the Campus Police had the time logged as 12:24 p.m.

John A. Darnell, a senior journalism student, standing on the Taylor veranda with a 15 year old Japanese made camera around his neck, took three photographs during the firing.One would appear on two pages of Life Magazine - nine Guardsmen with rifles leveled. A left handed soldier, gripping a [.45?] stood crouched a foot or two ahead. 
It appears as if he is leading the squad.
Eventually, the FBI would believe it knew the identity of the man with the .45.
His name is Mike Pryor. He is a career Army man, forty-ish bald and the first sergeant for the 145th. He lives on a tree shaded residential street close to downtown Akron with his wife and two frisky dogs.
His wife was terrified when she heard a false report over the radio that two guardsmen had been killed. 

Pryor is left handed. Normally, though he shoots with his right hand. Before the ascent to Blanket Hill, he had burned his right hand. 
To the FBI he acknowledged he was on the hill armed with a .45. 
He recalls drawing the weapon when the firing began. He said the man in the Life photograph "could be" him. He said he doesn't believe it is. 
He said he did not fire. 

The FBI, which now has the weapon believes he is correct. 
Although it appears in the photograph that the weapon is in a recoil position, gun experts point out that the shooter's arm is stiff. If fired, the recoil would jerk the arm upwards. 
Conceivably however he could have had the gun aimed to the ground and had it jerk upward upon discharge. 
The FBI believes a more likely explanation is that the weapon is either in "lock and load" position or jammed. 
To a reporter, first Sgt. Pryor denied that he was on the hill. 
"I've been in battle before" he said, "and I couldn't remember what happened five minutes afterwards."

The FBI investigation, which already consists of six volumes has yet to produce any physical evidence to substantiate rumors of sniper fire. 
Although the FBI's ballistic labwork is incomplete, the preliminary findings is that all metal fragments recovered were consistent with the military weapons used on the hill. It is probable that when the FBI makes a full report to the justice department, which may or may not ever become public, it will find that 15 or 20 men fired 50 to 60 rounds. 
One nervous guardsman said he fired five times ....
"I did not see a man raise a stick to give an order, and I did not hear any sniper," photographer Darnell said. 
"when they stopped, a couple of soldiers walked toward the wounded student on the walk. They just looked down at him, and walked off."
Darnell's photograph showed plainly an apple blossom tree blooming behind the pagoda. There were no students in his photograph, harassing or fleeing under gunfire - only the Ohio National Guard. 

Terry Strubbe, a freshman from Cleveland , had left his 5 year old Sharp "Campus Pet" tape recorder, purchased for $40 with his "paper route profits" in his first floor room at Johnson Hall. 
"I sat it on the windowsill and plugged it in and left it about noon" His tape ran 50 minutes. 
The FBI took it a week later. 
"I timed the shooting by second hand on my wrist watch. It lasted 13 seconds. I'm positive of that, 
"It is real clear. There are two shots - bam  bam- followed immediately by a barrage, then a two second gap, and one shot by itself."
At least two others tapes were made of the gunfire, neither complete. A WKYC sound man from Cleveland standing near the victory bell, pivoted and swung his rifle microphone toward the shooting. 
Starting late, he caught 9.5 seconds. A cluster of shots are clearly distinguishable at the beginning then give way to an undeciphered mass volley. The shots trail off distinctly, seven separately - then a single shot 1.5 seconds at the end.. A WKNT radioman from Kent taped six seconds. 

The eight Guard officers on the hill at the moment of the firing led their men back to the ruins of the ROTC Building where they had begun their sweep about 30 minutes before. 
They left behind four dying students and nine wounded. 
When Sgt. Antram reached the bottom of the hill, down 149 feet from the concrete pagoda 753 feet away, he felt like crying. 
"I just couldn't believe it. I remember my first thought. I'm getting out of the Guard. I'm a C.O., baby," (conscientious objector) 

Twenty minutes later Capt. Martin - who would retrieve from the daisy yellowed meadow a two pound rock to put on the china cabinet in his farmhouse dining room near the pictures of Christ and Dwight Eisenhower - ordered his men to write down their statements in their own words, labeled and misspelled. 
On lined notebook paper, Philip Duane Raber wrote:
"Others in my unit fired and I tried but wouldn't fire. I was extracted first round and fired three more over head as wound."
And then crossed out the word "wound" and wrote, "warning and heard order to stop. Also, I was bit in the mouth with a rock and busted a tooth. I was on right flank, thurd squaid, second platoon."

Pvt. Lonnie D. Hinton wrote:
"I was acting with my participating company. I heard them fire, so I fired one round straight into the air. The reason was they were all around us and I thought it was the most suitable thing to do at the time. The college students were throughing rocks at us. The tear gas didn't work too good because we would through the gas bombs at them and they would through them right back at us."
Capt. Martin read aloud a statement from a guardsmen left unnamed. 
"I thought I heard the command to fire. The students were throwing rocks and to close for the safety of our een. I discharged one round over the students' heads in the trees.... I was also hit twice by rocks. I was approximately in the center of the line formation."

Capr. Martin folded another statement so the name couldn't be rad. 
"Why working with a Company 145 Infantry I heard shots being fired. I was potioned in the center of the force. I fired two round into the air. I also lost one round in ejecting. I fired a m-q rifle I was hit in the foot with a rock 
"As we were in our movement, we were assaulted by rock and brick throwing, name calling such as (F---ing pig) listed in parenthesis (green pigs), (pigs)."

Afterward a National Guard chaplain walked along a thin white rope near the charred ruins of the ROTC building. 
"Gen. Canterbury told me and another officer to tell every man not to fire again - unless an officer tapped him on the shoulder and told him to," said Capt. John Simons, an Episcopalian clergyman from Cleveland, the unit chaplain. 
Capt. Simons would go home and get drunk that night. 
"Like what is a brigadier general doing screwing around all those troops?..... Those silly asses (officers) from Columbus.... I'm not blaming the kids... They were shook, they were shocked, they were all broken up."

In the grimy balcony bleachers of Wills Gym outside the "War Room" headquarters nine hours later, Robert Caterbury, 55, a shaken man, a general without combat experience, would watch carefully as a newsman took notes. 
In a riot situation. If there is a sniper can you sanction indiscriminate firing by volley?
"Hopefully, in this situation my men did not fire indiscriminately," Canterbury replied 
He saw the reporter write "hopefully" 
"Don't say hopefully, " he said "You'd have to ask each man individually,"
"Considering the size of the rocks and the proximity of 

See WE WERE Page A-23

Saving...

A22 Akron Beacon Journal , Sunday May 24, 1970 SPECIAL KENT STATE SECTION Horn Roared : "This Assembly Is Unlawful" Continued From Page A-17 an announcement five times. He said he looked at his watch. It was 11:58 a.m. It wasn't exactly the stilted language of the "Revised Code Section 2923:51: Where five or more persons are engaged in violent or tumultuous conduct.. shall forthwith ..desist." "This assembly is unlawful! The crowd must disperse at this time. This is an order!" the disembodied voice of the bullhorn demanded. "We shouted him down," said Steve Tarr, a freshman from Akron. He remembered the response. "Off the pigs ! Off the pigs! F--- the pigs ! F--- the pigs!" " One, two, three, four." in a unisoned shout, "we don';t want your F----- war!" the din rose. "Ho, Ho. HO, Chi Minh! The NLF is gonna win!" "Two, four six eight,. We don't want your fascist state" "Disperse!" the bullhorn ordered, and a rock arched from the crowd, bounced on the grass, and hit the side of the jeep. Uncounted others - scores or hundreds - would soon fly, "It just seemed like we were in a cloud part of the time," Gen. Robert H. Canterbury would recall. "A half of a brick almost knocked me down," said Maj. Jones. The troops had been assembled hurriedly. "I didn't even have a chance to go to the bathroom," said Sgt, Russell Repp, 23,, a Wooster tile and floor installer. "I hadn't slept in two nights He had no lunch. Tim Shaffer, a cook for A Company, said "We had chow mein and fruit salad for 250 men, About 10 guys ate." Guardsman Jim Haiflich, a jeep driver from Ravenna, took care of it himself. He stopped at a Burger Castle. Art Krummel, like uncounted other guardsmen, remained off campus that noon. He guarded the town's sewage plant. In conference on the commons, Maj. Hones Lt. Col. Charles Fasssinger and Gen. Canterbury, the ranking brass, decided to form a skirmish line and forcefully break up the unlawful assembly. A few minutes after 12 noon, the guard formed a single long line in front of the ruins of the ROTC building. They put on gas masks. On order, they moved out in a skirmish line, bayonets fixed and unsheathed. Their mission: Disperse the students. Although there were perhaps 800 guardsmen at Kent that day, the dozens of photographs, of the skirmish line would show no more than 66. Capt. Ron Snyder took another contingent around the opposite northeast side of Taylor Hall. He said he had 42 men. Their weapons were loaded, live ammunition in the chambers, the M1's at "lock and load" A soldier would have to flick forward safely before pulling a trigger. "This is our standard operating procedure," said Sgt. Mike Delany an Akron public relations man. It was the 145th's fifth call up for domestic disturbance since 1966. "Most of the guys had one or two clips" said Sgt. Dale Antram, referring to the initial call out for Teamster trouble five days before. Some ammunition was issued at KSU. "Nobody thought they had bullets," said Mike Glaser, 27. a graduate studying T.S .Eliot. "I had pictures of them SHE WIPES UP BLOOD WITH FLAG loading bullets into the guns and I didn't realize it. Everyone just assumed they didn't " "If we'd been black, we'd been smarter," said Glaser. "The agitators has these kids believing we had blanks. Somebody to.d them that," said Guard Capt. John E. Martin c. The Guard moved across the Commons, firing canisters of tear gas from M-79 grenade launchers, known as "elephant guns" the gas streaked skyward toward the students moving not unlike a herd of animals upward over "Blanket Hill " behind Taylor Hall. The campus radio log put the time at 12:05 p.m. Not everyone fled. Some students made forays from the massed body, retrieved the canisters and hurled them back toward the advancing guard. At that moment William D. Taylor, the retired journalism professor for whom the modernistic 20 pillared building was named in 1967, was attending as a consultant a meeting on outdoor drama at New Philadelphia. The drama outside his building intensified. "Some of those kooks had to be on dope," said Maj. Jones "I bet they've got needle marks on their arms, They were dancing and jiggling and throwing back the gas." Much of the gas drifted back toward the Guard on the southwesterly wind. I picked up a canister and threw it back, but I stuck my face in the darn thing and had to be carried away," said Ben Parsons, 22, a drama senior wearing a headband. "it almost got to be a joke because the National Guardsmen were laughing. It as just a game. "The girls were hanging out the windows of the dorms, throwing us jars of cold cream, Noxzema and Vaseline for the gas. They really work great," Parsons said. The Guard swept to the crest of "Blanket Hill" beside Taylor Hall. Students kept their distance. "I ran into the men's room at Taylor," said Jackie Stewart, the secretary for Dean Myron J. Lunine. "Everyone was. It was closest." At least one youth came well equipped. He wore his own gas mask. Others wore gloves. "You could get 'e, (gas canisters) with your bare hands on the bottom before they got warm," said Steve Tarr, a young man accustomed to throwing footballs. The Guard appeared more uncomfortable than pressured. "I remember breathing very hard with all that junk on as we walked up the hill," said Pvt. Paul Navjoks. "The rock throwing was just occasional. The guy beside me got hit in the shoulder. I never got hit. It seemed like we were trying to drive the bad guys out of there." Major Jones Tries To Stop Shooting " I still remember this one guy - the Apache headband with a flag. I thought to myself, these guys are crazy. You never knew who was a spectator and who was a rioter," With the veranda of Taylor Hall nearly deserted, the Guard swept over "Blanket Hill" without praise and down to the football practice field. They lined up close to a chain link fence, topped iwth barbed wire extending outward. This put the Guard much closer to the gravel of the parking lot southeast of Prentice Hall. "It was the heaviest rock throwing. I got hit 10 time." said Guard Sgt. Russelll Repp. "They were just having a good time. They thought we were a bunch of nobodies. "One good sized kid kept coming up behind me and stoning me from behind, then lying down about 25 yards away. I picked up a rock and ran and threw it back. I got him." The crowd, now gathering on the front slope of Taylor Hall, alternately cheered and booed as a boy in white sneakers and Guardsmen hurled the same canister back and forth twice. The Guard gave up on the tear gassing. "It wasn't doing any good," said Repp "We didn't run out. I still had eight canisters on a bandolier." Sixteen Guardsmen dropped to one knew on the practice field and seven aimed their M1's in firing position. "No one fired," said John Kifner, a New York Times reporter in the parking lot. Richard Schreiber, a journalism professor, peered through binoculars on the veranda and "saw a man in unfiorm with the troops draw a .45 pistol;" He aimed over the rock throwers and fired at least one round over their heads."Schreiber claimed he saw a tiny puff of smoke." "It was still a yuk yuk yukkety crowd,"said Chris Butler, drama student with Mickey Mouse on his T-shirt. "The Guard was rattled and they were out of gas and they had to move out and everybody cheered," As the time approached 12:20 p.m., the Guard moved off the practice filed and circled back up the slope in front of Taylor Hall. "We were walking up the hill but we were thinking behind us," said Sgt. Antram, who couldn't wear his glasses because of his mask "We were always glancing over our shoulders and guys were saying "Back there !" "Watch it" "Here comes a rock !" Pvt. Paul Zimmerman said "It as hard to see through that plastic. To look behind you, you'd have to turn your head all the way around. I was hot and sweaty" "They all got into formation and they started back up the hill. They walked at a pretty fast pace. Then they started running," said Ben Parsons, the headbanded drama student. "Everybody started screaming because it was like we'd won." "Almost all of us were in movement toward the National Guard. We were going at a slow walk. But I estimate 25 or 30 kids were running up the hill chasing them. Nobody was throwing any rocks. Five or six boys were close enough to touch them." Precisely what transpired in the next moment perhaps will forever be in dispute. The mind of man is flawed and imperfect. Man often believes what he wants to believe. The Guardsmen reached the crest of "Blanket Hill" Guardsmen opened fire. Forever the contention will be asserted that the shooting was unnecessary. The Guard could have called for reinforcements. The Guard could have fired warning shots into the air. The Guard could have aimed low, firing only to wound. The Guard could have warned its tormentors by bullhorn that its weapons were loaded. The Guard could have marched on over the hill - for it was not surrounded - and fired not at all. "All of a sudden they just turned and went to their knees and I thought they're going to scare us or something - they started shooting," said Danny Merman, 19, a student. "Everyone was up tight. No one was thinking of firing. Then I heard small arms fire, three shots, it might have been an echo, and the guys returned the fire," said Russell Repp, a Guardsman. "I was waiting for an order to shoot," said Paul Navjoks, a stocky 25 year old truck loader. "I knew if I heard a command I would have shot. "I thought to myself, man, how are we going to get out of here? There is no way. They were getting closer and closer with those rocks and we were surrounded. "If we got to hand to hand combat, they would have overtaken us, and taken our bayonets, and started sticking us with our bayonets. If they come, I thought, they'll come like a mob. There was only two ways out of there. To run down the hill or shoot and hold them back . "We got to the crest of the hill and I was walking away and I heard all this noise. And I thought who'd be shooting firecrackers at a time like this? "I turned and when I saw all those guys falling in front. I knew we were safe. They couldn't keep coming..... It was relief. I felt it was out only way out. "Everything happened so fast it was like a car wreck." "Somebody was yelling, 'Watch where you shoot!' and afterwards, Major Jones was shaking his head like he was knocking his head on something. " "I seen at least a couple spin, lock the butts of their rifles against their hips and fire straight up into the air and I seen some spin and fire without even looking," said Ben Parsons, student. "They got almost to the top of the hill, and just like on command, like one movement, they turned and started shooting... people got up right away and started yelling 'Murder!' said John Dienert, a student "I think I was closer than anyone. I was less than 10 feet away on the concrete at Taylor hall. They turned together. I did not hear an order to fire. I'm positive I would have. I heard no single shot. There was no snipe. They just started shooting," said Jackie Stewart, the dean's secretary " I was sure they were blanks, I just stood there." "I was harassing this officer. I threw a stone at him, and he pointed a .45 caliber pistol at me. He was brandishing a swagger stick. He turned away. He was holding his baton in the air, and the moment he dropped it they fired." said Jim Minard, a student . "I didn't feel threatened," said Capt. Ray Srp, "and I was in the center of it." "Eight or 10 of my men were disorientated. I was down [there?] physically dragging them back up when I heard two or three pops from down near the gym. I thought somebody had a .32 pistol. But now, I don't know whether it was a .22 or kids popping paper caps or what," said Capt. John E. Martin. Much later, after the Inspector General took statements, Capt. Martin would tell his men not to worry, they had not been warned of their Constitutional rights. "Not all the Guardsmen turned around and started shoot "I didn't feel threatened, and..." ing at us. Not all of them panicked. That's what it was - [Panic?]" said Dick Woods, a student. When the firing ceased - for a second, two seconds, several - a terrible stillness hung in the air. Even the G-sharp of the bell reverberating only seconds before, fell silent. Donald L. Schwartzmiller, the chief of the Campus Police had the time logged as 12:24 p.m. John A. Darnell, a senior journalism student, standing on the Taylor veranda with a 15 year old Japanese made camera around his neck, took three photographs during the firing.One would appear on two pages of Life Magazine - nine Guardsmen with rifles leveled. A left handed soldier, gripping a [.45?] stood crouched a foot or two ahead. It appears as if he is leading the squad. Eventually, the FBI would believe it knew the identity of the man with the .45. His name is Mike Pryor. He is a career Army man, forty-ish bald and the first sergeant for the 145th. He lives on a tree shaded residential street close to downtown Akron with his wife and two frisky dogs. His wife was terrified when she heard a false report over the radio that two guardsmen had been killed. Pryor is left handed. Normally, though he shoots with his right hand. Before the ascent to Blanket Hill, he had burned his right hand. To the FBI he acknowledged he was on the hill armed with a .45. He recalls drawing the weapon when the firing began. He said the man in the Life photograph "could be" him. He said he doesn't believe it is. He said he did not fire. The FBI, which now has the weapon believes he is correct. Although it appears in the photograph that the weapon is in a recoil position, gun experts point out that the shooter's arm is stiff. If fired, the recoil would jerk the arm upwards. Conceivably however he could have had the gun aimed to the ground and had it jerk upward upon discharge. The FBI believes a more likely explanation is that the weapon is either in "lock and load" position or jammed. To a reporter, first Sgt. Pryor denied that he was on the hill. "I've been in battle before" he said, "and I couldn't remember what happened five minutes afterwards." The FBI investigation, which already consists of six volumes has yet to produce any physical evidence to substantiate rumors of sniper fire. Although the FBI's ballistic labwork is incomplete, the preliminary findings is that all metal fragments recovered were consistent with the military weapons used on the hill. It is probable that when the FBI makes a full report to the justice department, which may or may not ever become public, it will find that 15 or 20 men fired 50 to 60 rounds. One nervous guardsman said he fired five times .... "I did not see a man raise a stick to give an order, and I did not hear any sniper," photographer Darnell said. "when they stopped, a couple of soldiers walked toward the wounded student on the walk. They just looked down at him, and walked off." Darnell's photograph showed plainly an apple blossom tree blooming behind the pagoda. There were no students in his photograph, harassing or fleeing under gunfire - only the Ohio National Guard. Terry Strubbe, a freshman from Cleveland , had left his 5 year old Sharp "Campus Pet" tape recorder, purchased for $40 with his "paper route profits" in his first floor room at Johnson Hall. "I sat it on the windowsill and plugged it in and left it about noon" His tape ran 50 minutes. The FBI took it a week later. "I timed the shooting by second hand on my wrist watch. It lasted 13 seconds. I'm positive of that, "It is real clear. There are two shots - bam bam- followed immediately by a barrage, then a two second gap, and one shot by itself." At least two others tapes were made of the gunfire, neither complete. A WKYC sound man from Cleveland standing near the victory bell, pivoted and swung his rifle microphone toward the shooting. Starting late, he caught 9.5 seconds. A cluster of shots are clearly distinguishable at the beginning then give way to an undeciphered mass volley. The shots trail off distinctly, seven separately - then a single shot 1.5 seconds at the end.. A WKNT radioman from Kent taped six seconds. The eight Guard officers on the hill at the moment of the firing led their men back to the ruins of the ROTC Building where they had begun their sweep about 30 minutes before. They left behind four dying students and nine wounded. When Sgt. Antram reached the bottom of the hill, down 149 feet from the concrete pagoda 753 feet away, he felt like crying. "I just couldn't believe it. I remember my first thought. I'm getting out of the Guard. I'm a C.O., baby," (conscientious objector) Twenty minutes later Capt. Martin - who would retrieve from the daisy yellowed meadow a two pound rock to put on the china cabinet in his farmhouse dining room near the pictures of Christ and Dwight Eisenhower - ordered his men to write down their statements in their own words, labeled and misspelled. On lined notebook paper, Philip Duane Raber wrote: "Others in my unit fired and I tried but wouldn't fire. I was extracted first round and fired three more over head as wound." And then crossed out the word "wound" and wrote, "warning and heard order to stop. Also, I was bit in the mouth with a rock and busted a tooth. I was on right flank, thurd squaid, second platoon." Pvt. Lonnie D. Hinton wrote: "I was acting with my participating company. I heard them fire, so I fired one round straight into the air. The reason was they were all around us and I thought it was the most suitable thing to do at the time. The college students were throughing rocks at us. The tear gas didn't work too good because we would through the gas bombs at them and they would through them right back at us." Capt. Martin read aloud a statement from a guardsmen left unnamed. "I thought I heard the command to fire. The students were throwing rocks and to close for the safety of our een. I discharged one round over the students' heads in the trees.... I was also hit twice by rocks. I was approximately in the center of the line formation." Capr. Martin folded another statement so the name couldn't be rad. "Why working with a Company 145 Infantry I heard shots being fired. I was potioned in the center of the force. I fired two round into the air. I also lost one round in ejecting. I fired a m-q rifle I was hit in the foot with a rock "As we were in our movement, we were assaulted by rock and brick throwing, name calling such as (F---ing pig) listed in parenthesis (green pigs), (pigs)." Afterward a National Guard chaplain walked along a thin white rope near the charred ruins of the ROTC building. "Gen. Canterbury told me and another officer to tell every man not to fire again - unless an officer tapped him on the shoulder and told him to," said Capt. John Simons, an Episcopalian clergyman from Cleveland, the unit chaplain. Capt. Simons would go home and get drunk that night. "Like what is a brigadier general doing screwing around all those troops?..... Those silly asses (officers) from Columbus.... I'm not blaming the kids... They were shook, they were shocked, they were all broken up." In the grimy balcony bleachers of Wills Gym outside the "War Room" headquarters nine hours later, Robert Caterbury, 55, a shaken man, a general without combat experience, would watch carefully as a newsman took notes. In a riot situation. If there is a sniper can you sanction indiscriminate firing by volley? "Hopefully, in this situation my men did not fire indiscriminately," Canterbury replied He saw the reporter write "hopefully" "Don't say hopefully, " he said "You'd have to ask each man individually," "Considering the size of the rocks and the proximity of See WE WERE Page A-23